Muskegon's First Woman Doctor
Dr. Lunette Powers, who came to Muskegon in 1900, was the first woman to practice medicine here and one of the first women doctors in Michigan.
She entered the Women's Medical School in Chicago, a part of Northwestern University, and graduated in 1897 at age 22. She was the daughter of pharmacists from Portland, Mich., and counted physicians among her grandfathers and her great-grandfathers.
After her internship at the Mary Thompson Hospital for women and children in Chicago she became resident physician at Women's Hospital in Detroit before coming to Muskegon.
When Hackley Hospital opened in 1904, she was appointed head of obstetrics. Before she retired, she was credited with delivering more than 5,000 Muskegon residents.
In her early years of practice, she made the rounds of her patients' homes on foot, gradually working up to a bicycle, then to a horse and buggy and finally to the automobile.
During World War II, she sent a weekly letter to the Muskegon physicians who were serving overseas, and when they returned home "Dr. Powers' Boys" liked to get together, trade war stories and honor the woman who had kept them informed on medical affairs in Muskegon.
Her honors were not limited to occasional banquets with "the boys." In 1950, she was named "Michigan's Foremost Family Physician" by the Michigan State Medical Society and was subsequently honored by a joint resolution of the Michigan State Senate and House of Representatives. In 1951, Northwestern University, her alma mater, named her as the graduate who had done the most to honor the school and her field.
Reprinted with permission from the Muskegon Chronicle
